WEST SENECA, N.Y. (WKBW) — For years, people living in a quiet West Seneca neighborhood say power outages were a regular part of life, often triggered by dead trees and falling branches tangled in overhead power lines.
7 News Anchor Jeff Russo first covered the problem in 2024.
"You people out there need to get your (expletive) together," one resident told Russo.
You can watch his story below.
Our team went back to the area just after Thanksgiving, where residents pointed to rows of dead and dying ash trees, trees they believed were responsible for repeated outages hitting the same small group of homes again and again.
One resident told 7 News the outages became so frequent, they started keeping track.
"After this being a running joke with family and friends, I actually started to log the power outages," the resident said.
Neighbors said they contacted NYSEG multiple times over the years, asking for help and warning about the dead trees near the lines, but felt their concerns were going unanswered.
That changed after 7 News first reported on the issue, and town leaders stepped in.
WATCH: Dead tree removal brings relief for West Seneca neighbors after years of power outages
NYSEG now confirms it has removed and trimmed more than 100 dead ash trees from the neighborhood, saying the trees posed a risk to power lines and reliable service.
West Seneca Town Supervisor Gary Dickson said back in November that outages often affected the same grid of roughly 250 households.
For many of the residents who typically lost power, the lights stayed on.
"There did seem to be an improvement," Dickson said. "But time will tell if that was just our imagination or if it’s really going to be a long-term fix," he added.
Some people in the neighborhood did still lose power during the storm.
Town officials say that outage was caused by a downed power pole brought down by strong winds, not falling trees or branches. NYSEG confirmed the outages.
For neighbors who say they’ve dealt with years of frustration and uncertainty, the difference was noticeable.
After years of outages, residents say this week’s storm brought something they haven’t had in a long time, relief.
